When the Spirit Bleeds, Words Are Worthless
by My-Alphabet-Soup
Summary: "For there is nothing heavier than compassion. Not even one's own pain weighs so heavy as the pain one feels with someone, for someone, a pain intensified by the imagination and prolonged by a hundred echoes." - Milan Kundera. Semi-canon. No pairings. Eventual character death.
1. Chapter 1

**A/N READ THIS: Important information regarding the story is contained in this author's note, so read on to discover what it is.**

**I haven't written any Fanfiction or attempted writing in any capacity for over a year for personal reasons, so this is my big return. It's a little rusty and nothing too daring, but it's just to get me back in the swing of things.**

**A few notes about this story:**

**It is complete and so will be updated regularly**

**It is semi-canon (i.e. it follows the vague storyline, but since I don't just want you to be reading the movie, I have changed/added scenes. One example is in this very chapter where they are all meeting at the bridge. It will not follow the script of the movie and is somewhat different.)**

**There is another character of my own creation (whom I promise is not a Mary-Sue)**

**I am aware that sometimes X-Men and Avengers exist in the same universe; however that is not the case here. Avengers only. (Although I do love X-Men)**

**Disclaimer: If you recognise it, it's not mine.**

"Sir…are you sure about her?" Agent Hill asked, not looking at the man she was addressing.

Nick Fury sighed deeply with all the nuances of a man at war with himself, "I don't think anyone can ever be completely _sure_ about her. But then again…we're bringing Banner in, aren't we?" He laughed humourlessly and Agent Hill grimaced. Fury turned towards the Agent standing beside him, no longer wishing to see the roiling turbulence of ocean in front of them. She turned to face him as well just as he said, "But I can't help but feel a little more relaxed that we'll have someone like her around…someone who can do what she does best. I've never met or heard of anyone with this particular skill set. Part of me wonders if I've made a mistake in inviting her here…but the rest of me knows that she will come in handy. And who knows? Maybe that's what will make all the difference," he turned to head back inside.

"The difference, sir?" Agent Hill murmured as she fell in behind the brooding man.

"The fate of the world, Agent, may very well rest on the shoulders of the group that we are currently calling in from all corners of the world. She might be the key to it all," he replied, before turning off into one of the many doors along the hallway, leaving Agent Hill alone.

"The key…" she mused as she kept walking towards the bridge.

* * *

A day later, Captain Steve Rogers, Agent Natasha Romanoff, Dr Bruce Banner, Tony Stark and Thor had been gathered onto the ship – now turned helicarrier – but had not yet had the chance to meet as a group. _That_ particular opportunity had arisen not long after Bruce and Steve had arrived.

"Dr Banner, we will show you to your work area right after you meet the team," Agent Hill told the timid-looking man.

"Team? What exactly am I here for? I was told that I wouldn't be doing any fighting. I was told that the Other Guy wasn't needed," Dr Banner said warily, slowing his pace.

Agent Hill opened her mouth to answer, but was interrupted as Director Fury walked up behind them, "We need your expertise in a matter of great urgency. You read the information packet, yes?" Dr Banner nodded slowly, "Good. Then you know what the Tesseract is. We need you to find it."

"And…then I go?" the smaller man prompted.

"Then you are free to do as you please," Director Fury nodded in acquiescence.

Bruce considered this for a moment, nodded in confirmation, and the three of them started walking again. Once they reached the bridge, Bruce looked around to see Steve and Natasha seated at the large table to the left. He turned back to Agent Hill, "I don't understand. I've already met them. Shouldn't I just get to work?"

"Stark and Thor should be here as well. Never in the places you want them to be, are they," the Director grumbled and Bruce gave him a wry smile.

"I'm not sure Tony Stark's reputation is much oriented around following orders at the best of times. His reputation certainly seems to be preceding him."

"Very astute. Dr Banner, I presume," came a voice from behind them, and they all turned to see Tony Stark strutting towards the table. When he was close enough, he threw out his hand in the direction of Bruce, who hesitantly took it in his. Stark grasped the man's hand and shook firmly once before clapping the man on the back and then moving right past him to take his place at the table, "Oooh, swivel chairs. Fancy."

"Nice of you to join us. Finally," Steve shot at him snippily.

"_I_ certainly thought so. It's not every day you're in the presence of Tony Stark himself," Tony smirked, as he examined the upholstery on the armrest of his chair, "Now how about we get down to – what is this, suede? I like it – anyway, how about we get down to business, hm?"

"We're still waiting on Thor," Natasha reminded him, though her interest in the goings on appeared to be declining rapidly.

"Oh that lummox wouldn't know what we were talking about anyway. Didn't seem like the brightest spark when I ran into him last. I suppose you can all see the irony there," Stark grinned.

As Steve was about to answer – his eyes narrowed at the arrogant Stark – the group suddenly heard heavy footsteps that seemed to be getting louder.

"Why must Loki be locked up like a common criminal? He is my brother and should not come to harm! This is outrageous!" Thor boomed as he rounded the corner, his eyes flashing with untold anger.

"He is a danger to us all. He is not being harmed and nor will he be. But he will _also_ not be released from his cell. I understand that you are angry, but he has killed people, and we will not let him run around continuing to do so unobstructed," Fury replied.

Thor visibly bristled and tightened his grip on Mjolnir, but moved over to the table, choosing to stand rather than sit. Bruce also moved over to the table, taking a seat next to Natasha, fidgeting absent-mindedly with a loose thread on the sleeve of his shirt and his eyes flicking between the assembled guests. Conversation, led mostly by Tony, with Bruce interjecting occasionally, went steadily along the lines of tracking the Tesseract down and the ways in which it could possibly be done. Just as the conversation was turning to Loki, Steve suddenly perked up a bit more in his seat and said, "Who is that?"

Tony gave Steve a look that said _I-don't-like-to-be-interrupted_, but then turned his head in the direction that everyone else had turned. He wasn't quite sure where he was supposed to be looking, but then a thin girl with jet-black hair stepped out of the shadows. She had pale, gaunt-looking skin and her eyes had rings of darkness underneath them, suggesting either sickness or a lack of sleep. The features of her face all seemed to clash, making it look as though they had all been selected from an array of people and then combined. Her mouth was ever-so-slightly curled downwards, her small nose wrinkling into a scowl and she appeared to be no older than 18. Her eyes were large, almost too large, and unblinking as they slid from one end of the table to the other, starting with Director Fury and ending with Bruce, whom she peered at for the longest. A look of intense pain flashed across her pale features and then she suddenly stole away down the corridor.

After a beat, Tony cleared his throat and looked at Fury before saying, "Um…what the hell was that?"

"She…doesn't have a name. Or if she does, she won't tell us what it is," the Director informed them all.

"To be fair, sir, she hasn't spoken to anyone since she arrived," Agent Coulson said with an amused grin.

"Well…yes, as Agent Coulson said, she hasn't told us _anything_. Nevertheless, we felt that she could be a useful asset to this team," Fury continued.

"What exactly does she _do_?" Natasha asked, her steely gaze turning upon Fury.

"She has telekinetic abilities," Fury answered calmly.

Everyone at the table sat up a little straighter at this, all except Bruce, who looked deep in thought.

"Telekinetic?" Thor repeated, "Stop treating us as though we were children and just tell us what it is that you speak of!"

"She can do things that have never been recorded or seen anywhere else. She can control things if she wishes, inanimate and animate, she can become intangible at will, she can read minds –"

"Woah, woah, woah, my brain is not for public consumption, thank you very much, Patches," Stark interjected, throwing up a hand. Fury frowned at the nickname.

"We…believe that she can only read minds when in physical contact with the person," Fury informed him.

"'Believe'? Now that's just not good enough. You don't even know the kid's name! And, _and_ she _is_ just a kid! What, are you gonna send her out with us? Come on man, even I'm not that much of a dick," Tony finished his mini-rant as Steve murmured 'That's debatable'.

"She might be tougher than she looks," Natasha shot at Tony, obviously hinting that people often make the same mistake about her.

"I think we're done here. Dr Banner, I'll show you to your workspace," Fury said, then turned and started down the corridor, leaving Bruce to catch up to him.

"Hey, um…you said she has telekinetic abilities," Bruce stated once he had caught up with Director Fury, and Fury nodded, so he continued, "But that's not all, is it."

It was more of a statement than a question, but Fury was still reluctant to give him an explanation, "Why do you say that, Doctor?"

"When she looked at all of us…and she seemed to…to linger on me, and then she looked…in _pain_. She looked at me like she knew what I was feeling. Like she knew _exactly_ what I was feeling," Bruce murmured, almost to himself.

"We know very little of what the full extent of her powers are. They may be exactly as I described them earlier – she hasn't confirmed with us – but I think that there is quite a bit about her that we don't know, and maybe could never hope to know. We're actually quite surprised that she even accepted our invitation to come here. It's strange though…yesterday she didn't look half as sickly as she does today. She has shown evidence of empathic abilities, so maybe that's just because tensions are high. We thought it might come in handy if –"

"If the Other Guy wants to join the party. I get it. You think you can use her as some kind of band-aid for him? You think, what…she's got this ability that we don't even know that much about…don't know _anything_ about…and you'll put her in with a _Hulk_? Look, I-I'm all for helping you find the Tesseract, but I don't have any plans to lose my cool here, and even if I _do_…I don't want her anywhere near me," Bruce implored of the man standing before him. He hadn't even realised that they'd come to a halt in the middle of the corridor, "Do you understand me?"

"Perfectly," Fury bowed his head in a gesture of agreement.


	2. Chapter 2

Hours later, Bruce and Tony were working away in their temporary lab when Tony suddenly announced, "JARVIS, I want to know everything you can find about that girl."

Bruce was about to ask what Tony meant and who Jarvis was, but then a disembodied voice emanated from the direction of Tony's wristwatch, "Everything, sir?"

"Everything," Tony confirmed, then added, "Was the photo I took okay?"

"Quite a clear shot of her face, sir. I'll see what I can find," JARVIS replied.

Tony then turned to Bruce with a smirk and said, "We'll find out who she is," then paused before adding, "Not much of a looker, was she."

"I don't really…" Bruce started to say.

"Ah come on. You can admit it. Nothing seemed to…_match_. You know what I'm saying?"

"Not…exactly."

"Oh you're such a goody-goody. You don't have to be nice to everybody _all_ the time."

"Yeah but I have to make up for you not being nice _ever_, so…"

"That's close enough. How did that feel? Being a little mean to me, huh? Wasn't so hard, now was –" Tony suddenly stopped talking and cocked his head to the side. Turning slowly, he saw the girl standing unassumingly in the corner of the room, "How did you get in here? I've been facing the door the whole time," after a moment, realization dawned in his eyes and he smiled, "Oh that's right. You can go through walls. That's fun."

The girl cocked her head to mirror Tony and took a step towards him. For a moment nobody moved, but then she took another two steps towards him, moving as silently as a ghost. Tony looked over at Bruce for some kind of assistance, but then his eyes flicked back to the girl. He studied her carefully as she studied him. Taking another step towards him, Tony's nonchalant confidence seemed to waver as he took a big step backwards. From his position on the other side of the room, Bruce really looked at the girl. Her brow was furrowed, as though she was thinking unwanted thoughts, and her eyes appeared more sunken at this closer range. She was dressed all in black, but nothing as showy as Black Widow's unitard-outfit…thing. She wore black leggings and a black hooded jumper. Her feet were bare. When she took another step towards Tony, he held up one finger and said quite loudly, "No, no, that's close enough, thank you. My thoughts are not for you. Do you know how many secrets I have up here?" he asked her, pointing at his head.

"I don't want your secrets," she whispered so softly that Bruce wasn't even sure she had spoken. Then she turned to face Bruce, becoming so focused on him that she seemed to forget that Tony Stark was even in the room. The same look of pain that she had experienced in the bridge fluttered across her face. The furrow in her brow deepened as she moved closer to Bruce. The closer she got, the more pain she appeared to experience, until tears began to leak from her eyes. Then suddenly she opened her mouth and breathed, "There is much pain here," and then, without any warning, she closed her eyes, took a deep breath and disappeared into the floor as though it were nothing more than a cloud that she was falling through.

"Who in their right mind thought that she would be a good addition to this team?" Tony muttered as he shook his head, "That was weird. Okay. JARVIS, what have you got for me? Who is she?"

"I'm afraid, sir, that I've been unable to find anything about her. If I didn't know any better, I'd say that she didn't exist at all!"

"You aren't looking hard enough, JARVIS. If S.H.I.E.L.D managed to find her, then we sure as hell can. Speaking of S.H.I.E.L.D, I should be just about done hacking in, and then at least we'll know what they know," Tony grinned at the doctor before turning on a small tablet that was on the table behind him.

"You're hacking into S.H.I.E.L.D?" came the voice of Steve Rogers as he walked into the room.

"Hey, I just wanna know what they aren't telling us, okay? That's not a crime, is it?" Tony shrugged, but then added, "Wait, don't answer that."

"A crime to hack into government files? I'd say that's probably a crime," Steve shot at the goateed man.

"Didn't I just say '_don't_ answer that'?" Tony rolled his eyes, "Besides, don't you have damsels to be rescuing somewhere? Or _any_thing to do in any place other than here? We're hard at work, you know."

"I can see that," Steve replied, gesturing to Tony, who was still leaning back against a countertop, doing nothing but fiddling with his tablet.

Wanting to intervene before the words got too vitriolic, Bruce suddenly piped up with, "Maybe we should tell someone what happened, huh? The girl, whoever she is, spoke to us. Now if she hasn't spoken to a single person since she arrived here, there's probably a reason that she's done so here and now."

Fifteen minutes later, the room was full. Director Fury had turned up first, then Natasha had slunk in, and finally Thor had entered, all wishing to hear what had happened with the mysterious girl. Bruce explained what had happened, as Tony kept saying things like "She gives me the heebie jeebies."

As they were discussing it, a soft beeping from the direction of Bruce's computer monitor caused him to look over. It had located the Tesseract. But as he looked at the coordinates, something seemed off, and when he typed them in, his only reaction was a murmured, "Oh my god," before suddenly the entire helicarrier was being thrown sideways with the sound of an explosion. As the room was ripped apart, Bruce and Natasha fell completely through the floor, and everyone else was tossed around like ragdolls. Steve, already in his Captain America getup yelled at Tony to go and get his suit on, then turned to Thor and told him to check on his brother, and then helped Fury up before they both took off towards the bridge. Steve had assumed that Natasha would be able to just get out of the way if Dr Banner lost control. He didn't have time to stay and check when that might mean that whoever had attacked might hit them again and then they'd _all_ go down with the ship, as it were. What he didn't realise was that her leg had been trapped under some falling debris, and she couldn't pull herself free.

"Dr Banner! Bruce!" she shouted as she turned her head wildly, catching sight of the man in question about 5 metres from her. She instantly knew that he was on the verge of completely losing control and she tried again to free herself, "Bruce, just try to stay calm! We're going to be okay! Can you hear me? Bruce!"

His skin had already started turning green and his muscles were bulging. She started panicking a little as she tried desperately to free her leg. She heard a grunt from the direction of Bruce and she looked over again to see that his shirt had started splitting. With one big wrench of her leg, she managed to free herself and was quickly up and running. She heard a roar from behind her and knew that Dr Banner had now been completely replaced by the Hulk. She swung herself up and onto a walkway leading to a small corridor and she willed herself to ignore the pain in her leg and just run faster. The crunch of metal behind her told her that the Hulk was catching up. She heard his heavy footfalls as he roared again just as she reached the corridor. Moving quickly along it, her heart racing as her breathing hitched slightly in fear. There was not a lot that Natasha Romanoff was afraid of – but rampaging Hulks happened to be one of them. The tremors in the ground beneath her were none too subtle, and she could feel them getting stronger, which could mean only one thing; the Hulk was going to catch her. Just as she reached the end of the corridor that the Hulk was completely smashing his way through (since it was far too small for him) she felt a heavy smack to her left side, which caused her to sail through the air, hitting the wall of the room that she found herself in. Pulling herself quickly into a sitting position, she drew a gun and held it up, ready to shoot, but suddenly a black blur was throwing itself at the Hulk. Natasha realised that it was the mysterious girl, and wondered what she intended to do.

**A/N I would love to know what you think :)**


	3. Chapter 3

Just as the girl landed on the Hulk's massive shoulder and wrapped her hands and arms around his head, his hand (which was raised in a fist in order to squash Natasha) stopped and his whole body seemed to sag a little. As the girl held on tighter, the Hulk dropped to his knees and Natasha scrambled to get further away. She glanced up at the girl and saw a look of excruciating pain on her face. The longer she held onto the Hulk, the heavier her breathing seemed to get, she began to cry out in pain, and soon a trickle of blood started to flow from her nose and the corner of her mouth. Tears of anguish started to dampen her cheeks, and then they really started to flow as she began to sob. The Hulk dropped to the ground completely, laying there on his side as this raven-haired girl cradled his head tightly. Not long after she had started sobbing, green skin started to turn tan once more and his vast musculature started to diminish until it was Bruce, only Bruce – clothed in the tattered remains of his pants – that she was holding.

Natasha had not moved an inch since the girl had started sobbing but now she sat up a little straighter and started to half-crawl, half-drag her way over to the pair. She tentatively held up her hand and slowly brought it down to pat the girl on the back. As soon as her hand had made contact, however, the girl recoiled and let out another broken sob. Releasing her hold on Bruce's head, she suddenly shot her hand out to grab Natasha's wrist and pulled her towards the Doctor, who seemed to be shaking. Once her hand came into contact with Bruce, the girl stood up quickly and started to back away, "He's awake. Look after him," and then in the blink of an eye she was gone.

Natasha turned back to Bruce and saw that he did, in fact, have his eyes open, "Bruce? Can you hear me?"

"She just…made everything go _away_. I don't…u-understand," Bruce muttered, mostly to himself.

"Bruce, how are you feeling?" Natasha asked in a concerned voice.

Bruce's eyes flicked to Natasha and it was like he was just realising that she was there, "How…?"

Natasha chewed the inside of her lip, contemplating his questioning eyes. She didn't understand any better than Bruce did, "Your guess is as good as mine," but when she looked down again to see what Bruce was thinking, she saw that he was unconscious.

* * *

"Man down! Medic! We need a medic!" Fury was shouting at the Agents, who were all scurrying around like ants. He turned back to Phil Coulson, but it looked grim. The front of his white shirt already clung to him with the wet redness of his own blood, and the patch was only blossoming wider and wider by the second, "You're gonna be okay, you hear me?"

"We both know…that isn't true," Agent Coulson grimaced.

"Yes it is, now don't you give up on me!" Fury insisted, his face a mask of complete and utter rage. How could this have happened? "Where is that medic?!"

Agent Coulson opened his mouth to reply, but then something, or some_one_ caught his eye. Fury turned to see that it was the girl-with-no-name. He noted the smear of blood on her face where it appeared that she had attempted to clean it off, her red, puffy eyes, and the unmistakable look of someone suffering a great deal. She took a step towards the pair of men and Nick Fury seemed to know that he should just step aside and let her do…whatever it was that she did. She crouched down beside the injured man and took his hand in her own. Being this close to him seemed to cause her some sort of physical pain, but as she placed one hand on his chest, the Director felt a subtle shift in the air. As he watched, the girl's body started to glow softly and Agent Phil Coulson kept his eyes trained on hers. The injured man seemed to completely relax as the girl closed her eyes and scrunched up her nose, as if she was concentrating very hard on something.

"It's going to be okay, Phillip," she murmured, her voice taking on an ethereal quality that caused Nick Fury and Phil Coulson to believe her one hundred percent.

"I…I know," Phil whispered back, his eyes wide.

The moment between the two looked to be so personal that Fury almost turned away, but he was far too intrigued to do anything other than stare. The girl suddenly reached down and began to unbutton the top of his shirt so that the wound was visible. Placing her hands on either side of it, she breathed in sharply once and then the glow started to get brighter. Every Agent in the room had stopped and was staring at the pair. Right there in front of Nick Fury's eyes, the wound seemed to get smaller as bone reset in place, tissue and sinewy muscle sewed themselves seamlessly together, pink scar-tissue formed, and skin started to seal itself up.

But then the bright glow surrounding the girl dimmed for a moment and her eyes shot open. The wound stopped healing itself and the girl suddenly recoiled away from Phil. She let out a cry of anguish, and then coughed a spray of blood onto the floor in front of her.

"No! _No_!" she screamed, clutching the sides of her head. Fisting her hands in her hair, she coughed again and more blood spewed from her mouth and nose. Letting out another scream of sorrow, she slammed her hands down on the floor. Tears were streaming down her face, mixing with the blood, as she struggled to get a hold of herself.

"Someone get her out of here!" Fury suddenly yelled and two agents seized her arms. He knew that she could easily have escaped them by simply becoming intangible, but she looked almost deranged at that point.

She thrashed ferociously, attempting to free herself from the vice-like grip of these two men who were now attempting to drag her away from the scene. Screaming out again, her struggles started to lose strength as sobs overtook her body. Turning back to Agent Coulson, Director Fury noticed that his face held a look of complete serenity, as if he didn't even notice that entire scene being made. He glanced up at Fury, catching his eye and let a hesitant smile show.

"It's going to be okay," he smiled, echoing the girl's earlier words, and Fury crouched back down beside him, "I feel so…light. She made…all the pain…go away."

His voice was barely audible at that point and Nick realised that her violent reaction had been triggered when she must have realised that Agent Coulson could not be saved.

"But it's not…entirely a bad thing… I mean…now they'll actually have someone to…to av-" the words died in his mouth as the light finally left his eyes. Nick's chest tightened and he turned to see a medic finally rushing up, but he just slowly shook his head.

**A/N You don't have to review if you don't want to, but if you have any opinions I would love to know them :)**


	4. Chapter 4

When Bruce came around, he was in a bed in a room that he didn't recognise. As his eyes adjusted to the light, he cast his gaze around and saw that the nameless girl was in a bed on the other side of the small room. He felt quite fatigued, but didn't know how long he'd been out for. Slipping out of the bed, he realised they had only dressed him in grey trackpants, so he looked around again and shrugged on the hoodie hanging over the back of the only chair in the room. Slowly zipping it up, he turned back to the girl and made his way over. The girl had an IV needle in her hand and deep purple circles under her eyes. If she looked sick when he had first laid eyes on her, she looked positively deathly now. The moment he reached the bed, her eyes flicked open and she shrank back into the wall as much as she could.

"I-I'm not going to hurt you," Bruce insisted.

The girl just shook her head, "Yes you are."

He considered this for a moment and then asked, "What do you mean?"

She peered up at him, and he thought that she was about to explain, but then she said, "I couldn't help him."

"Who?"

"Phillip."

It took a moment for Bruce to register who she was talking about, "Coulson?" he asked, and she nodded, "What happened to him?"

"He died," she said. This shocked Bruce and he stood in silence for a moment before the girl continued, "I tried to…but…but I couldn't save him. I did everything right. But I was too late."

"What do you do exactly?"

She looked at Bruce warily. Honestly, he was surprised that he had gotten that much out of her. It was the most he'd heard her talk. Probably more than _anyone_ had heard her say. She turned away from him and picked at the needle for a moment before tearing it from her hand.

"What I do…" she paused as she searched for the right words, "Fury told you some of it – the telekinesis. That's not my main…_ability_. I…I _feel_ things. Bad things. When someone is sad, I feel exactly what they feel. When someone is hurt, I feel their pain. When someone is angry…" she trailed off and looked pointedly at Bruce. He realised that she meant that she could feel his anger all the time, and given the anger that was always simmering below the surface, he was surprised it hadn't crippled her, "And it…manifests itself into physical pain. Whatever I am picking up, no matter the emotion…if it's a bad one…it causes me pain."

"And what about good emotions? Happiness? Love?"

"They balance it out. But it doesn't matter where I go…people are always hurting in some way or another. I try to go to places that will have happy people. Or no people at all."

"So why did you come here?"

She weighed the question in her mind briefly and then replied with, "So I could help people."

"Help people…like you helped me."

She nodded, "I can take away pain from other people…but it's dangerous."

"Dangerous how?"

"The more I take…the more it affects me. They said I was coughing up a lot of blood when I was trying to help Phillip."

"So why did you help me? I mean…the Other Guy is pretty much _made_ of rage…weren't you afraid you might kill yourself?"

"You don't understand how difficult it's been for me to be on the same aircraft as you, let alone in the same room. When the Hulk appeared…it felt like someone had set every muscle in my body on fire. You…are always angry. You don't deserve that. I thought if I made it go away…then the Hulk might go away as well. If he had stayed even a minute longer…I…I might have gone insane," she murmured, her eyes not leaving the sheet of the bed she was on, "I had to help. If I died trying…then so be it."

It took a moment for Bruce to realise what she was saying. How difficult it must be for her, even now, to be right next to him. He thought about excusing himself, but if it was as bad as she said, it wouldn't matter where on this ship he ran to. But then something occurred to him as he thought back to when Nick Fury had told him that she had taken on quite a sickly appearance after Stark, Thor, Steve, and Bruce himself had arrived. They were the ones doing this to her.

"If being around me puts you in that much pain…why do you always seem to pop up when I'm around?"

"I've thought about taking it away before. Your anger, I mean. I wonder what it would do," she whispered as she turned her large eyes on him and lifted a hand to reach out towards him.

"No!" Bruce quickly yelled, stumbling backwards before she could come into contact with him. She gave him a small frown, so he explained, "No, I…I need the anger. To keep him at bay. It's sort of a…an embracing of who he is into who I am."

"I could take it away from you," she murmured as she looked at him through hooded eyes, "For good. You wouldn't have to be afraid anymore."

Bruce didn't immediately understand what she was saying to him. As it all started to make sense, his eyes widened and though he knew he would _never_ even consider that, not really, he couldn't stop himself saying, "You mean the…the Other Guy? The Hulk? You could…do that?"

She half-shrugged, "Maybe. I think so."

Bruce was speechless. Since he had unwittingly unleashed this fate upon himself, he never entertained the idea that there might be a way out, other than death. But he knew that if it hurt her that much just to ease him down from a loss of control…then what were the chances that she'd survive something like that.

After letting it sink in a little, Bruce sighed deeply and realised that that nagging feeling in the back of mind was a tiny bit of indignation. Saying that she had thought about taking the anger away from him implied that she might have done it without first asking him. And something else that he now realised was bothering him about what she had said was that, without meaning to, she was making him into something to be played with. Something abnormal. And while Bruce _was_ abnormal – he was the first to admit it – he didn't like it when other people instantly treated him so differently when they knew what he was. That was one of the reasons that he got on with Tony so well; he just treated him like he treated every single other person.

"I don't…think that would be the best idea," Bruce admitted, rubbing his forehead with his hand.

She looked away from Bruce and rubbed her eyes with the heels of her hands. His refusal seemed to bring an end to that topic, however she opened her mouth again and said, "I hope he was happy," and when Bruce said nothing, she elaborated, "Phillip. I hope that…in his last moments…he was happy."

Turning tortured eyes onto Bruce once more, the girl suddenly disappeared with a soft pop. Bruce took a step back in surprise, and then moved closer to the bed holding his hand out in front of him. Placing it onto the top of the mattress, he confirmed to himself that she was gone.

"What a strange girl," he muttered to himself.

* * *

"Sir, Barton is awake," Agent Hill informed Director Fury briskly.

"And…how is he?" Fury replied, wary of the answer.

"He isn't showing any signs that he's still brainwashed. Agent Romanoff is currently talking to him and she said he seems completely back to normal," Hill confirmed.

"Good. We could use a bit of good news," Fury said solemnly. They had failed to regain possession of the Tesseract, Loki had escaped, Thor had been thrown off the aircraft by Loki after getting himself trapped in Loki's capsule, and they had lost a man – one of their best.

Meanwhile in Clint's room, Natasha soaked a hand-towel in water and laid it across the man's forehead, "How does that feel?"

"Like I had my head smashed into a metal bar," Barton groaned.

"And how are you feeling otherwise?" Natasha asked with a pointed look.

"I feel completely in control of my faculties," he replied.

They both sat in silence for a moment before Natasha murmured, "What was it like?"

"It was…enlightening, in all the wrong ways," Barton shuddered as he remembered what it was like to feel a presence in his mind that was foreign…not his own, "I felt that…the cube could tell me everything I needed to know, everything I could ever _hope_ to achieve…this cube was going to show me the way."

"I guess that makes me feel a little better about ramming your head into a pole," she smirked.

"I should hold that against you forever," he chuckled.

"But you won't," Natasha smiled.

Clint opened his mouth to ask her how her leg was, but a soft popping noise behind them caused them both to jump. Looking around, their eyes locked onto the mysterious girl, who, Natasha noticed, was not wearing black, for once. She had been dressed in white cotton pants and a loose fitting t-shirt. She looked terribly thin - almost skeletal - and her skin was a sickly pale colour. In fact the only real colour in her face seemed to be the ever-present purple rings underneath her eyes.

"Who are you?" Clint asked.

"I'm here to check on you," she replied softly, refusing to make eye contact with him.

He looked to Natasha to see whether or not the girl was joking, but she just looked somewhat confused.

"You don't…look like a doctor," Clint confessed, looking the girl up and down.

"I'm not a doctor," she replied.

"Then…I'm confused."

"Has anyone mentioned me to you yet?" Clint shook his head, no, "I specialise in the mind. May I have your permission to access your thoughts?"

Clint looked at Natasha and she contemplated him for a moment, then glanced at the girl, then back to him, and she nodded. The girl moved forwards slowly and reached out a hand towards Clint's. As soon as she made contact, Clint felt his whole body go rigid. The feelings were back. A foreign body in his mind. He fought tooth and nail to expel this unknown entity. He had _just_ regained sole ownership of his head, and now that there was even the slightest chance that it would be taken from him again, he would not take that lying down. As he felt the foreignness started to melt away, the girl withdrew her hand and murmured, "Welcome back," before she slipped silently out the door.

**A/N Since I've only just returned to writing, I would love to know what you think. I'll continue the story regardless, but it would be lovely if I could have some feedback. Thank you for reading.**


	5. Chapter 5

Bruce eventually found his way to the room that he had been working in with Tony to find the Tesseract. When he entered the room, Tony looked up briefly from what he was doing, and then back at the screen.

"So…" Tony smirked.

Bruce looked at him with a puzzled look, "So…?" he asked, drawing out the word.

"Did you talk to the girl? You were in the same room as her, weren't you? Last I heard she was still asleep an hour ago but apparently she just dropped in on Barton. Read his mind, I hear," Tony informed Bruce, then added, "Got any goss for me?"

"Goss? What? No," Bruce replied, taken aback by the frivolity of the question.

"So she was gone when you woke up?" Tony looked a little disappointed.

"No. We _did_ talk," Tony perked right back up at this, "_Briefly_."

"So what's her name?"

"I…didn't ask," Bruce admitted, wondering to himself why he _hadn't_ asked her.

"Well what _did_ you talk about?" Tony rolled his eyes.

"When did you turn into a fifteen year old girl?" Bruce teased, smiling.

"Oh har har. Laugh it up, yes Tony Stark likes to gossip. Now tell me what you talked about, you big, green lump. Maybe I can use the information to find out more about her. Maybe she's –"

"I don't have a name," came a soft voice from behind the two men. Tony jumped about a foot in the air.

Trying to maintain his composure, he ran a hand through his hair, took a deep breath and said, "_Why_ do you insist on creeping around like that? Tony Stark doesn't like being snuck up on."

"I apologise, Tony Stark," the girl ducked her head in embarrassment.

"What do you mean you don't have a name? What do people call you?" Tony continued, ignoring her muttered apology.

She shrugged a little and said, "Sometimes people refer to me as the Ghost."

"The Ghost," Tony repeated experimentally, "It suits you. So, Miss 'the Ghost', where are you from?"

"I…don't know."

"What? You make no sense," Tony grumbled and took several large steps towards her. Suddenly he stopped in his tracks and let out a little 'Oof' as if he'd hit a wall…but there was nothing in front of him. Bruce looked at the girl's face and saw that she looked scared. Perhaps she thought Tony was going to hurt her. He looked back at Tony and saw that he had his hand raised, as if he was waving at the girl. But then Bruce realised that it was resting on something – something solid. Tony made a fist, drew it back, and then brought it down in a knocking motion. His hand seemed to meet the thin air in front of him with a hollow 'thunk', "Force field. Interesting," he took a step back and leaned casually on a countertop, "You know Fury is pretty…well…_furious_ with you," he told the girl, and she cocked her head, as if to ask why, "Something about…I don't know…you could've killed yourself, or…something. Blah, blah, blah, whatever. Anyway, I guess he thinks because you're so young he has to take care of you. Personally I think you can take care of yourself. Just don't sneak up on me again. Actually…I might put a bell on you."

"He thinks I'm too young to take care of myself?" the girl asked, blinking her large eyes in surprise.

"What the hell do I know?" Tony threw up his hands, but then reconsidered, adding, "Oh who am I kidding; I'm a genius."

There was silence in the room for a moment, and then suddenly the girl, quite out of the blue, said, "I want to go home."

Tony and Bruce both stared at her for a moment, "Where is home?" Bruce asked.

She shrugged and said, "Wherever I want it to be, I suppose. I just…I can't be here anymore. I know I said I came here to help people," she said, mostly to Bruce, "But it hurts too much. I'm not strong. I can't."

"Are you saying this because of what happened to Coulson?" Tony asked quite bluntly.

"I want to go home," she repeated, ignoring his question.

She started to tear up at this point, and Tony looked around at Bruce with his nose scrunched up. Clearly he had no idea what to do with a crying girl, so he just said, "Uh…don't-don't cry. I'm sure Fury will be happy to send you home."

But then she burst into tears and sank to the floor. Tony scrunched up a small piece of paper and threw it towards the girl to see if the force field was still up. It wasn't. The two men shared another look and then Bruce moved hesitantly towards the sobbing girl. When he was close enough to touch her, he crouched down and let his hand hover over her shoulder. Looking back at Tony, almost for reassurance, Tony shrugged and made a _how-the-hell-do-I-know-if-it's-safe_ face. Bruce took a small breath and brought his hand down on her shoulder comfortingly.

The jolt he experienced was instantaneous. It was as though a bolt of lightning had gone right through him, but he found that he could not remove his hand from the girl's shoulder. Images started to flash in front of him. Memories that were not his own started to force their way into his mind. He saw a small child, no older than three, being carried by a hysterically crying woman who looked very much like an older version of the teenage Ghost in front of him.

"Adriane," she was sobbing, "Adriane, you don't let them touch you! Do you hear me? Don't let them touch you!"

It was dark and rain fell mercilessly, drenching the pair. Suddenly he heard a bang that could only be the sound of a gunshot. Bruce watched as the woman's skull blew outwards and she fell to the floor, unmoving. The blood gushing from the new hole in her head was being washed away as quickly as it was flowing.

Two men dressed entirely in black suddenly came running up. One of them kicked the woman with the toe of his shoe, making sure she was dead, and then they rolled her over. The toddler was screaming as they wrenched her from the muddy ground. Struggling to hold onto the squirming child, the other man grabbed the exposed skin of her arm. Suddenly he crumpled to the ground, seemingly as a result of coming into contact with her. The remaining guy seemed to get scared at this and dropped the girl into the mud immediately.

Then the scene changed to some sort of forest. It was no longer night time and there was no rain falling. In front of Bruce was the same girl as before, only now she looked to be six or seven. She was clothed in rags, her hair was tangled and matted with filth, and her face was grimy and dirty. She was crouched behind a tree with a terrified look on her face.

"Where are you girly? I don't wanna hurt you! I just want to talk!" a man's voice yelled and Bruce looked around to see a guy dressed in black, as the men in the previous memory had been. In his hands was a large tranquiliser gun.

The man was getting closer and closer and suddenly the girl let out a petrified squeak. The man snarled and leapt around the tree to grab a hold of her. This man was wearing a thick-looking pair of gloves. He grabbed her shoulder and slammed her back into the tree. She clawed desperately at his arm, shrieking all the while, tears pouring down her face, leaving tracks in the grime. Dropping the tranquiliser gun to the ground, the man pulled out the handgun that sat at his waist and held it to her head. He laughed and said, "Maybe we don't even need to bring you in. I should just kill you now. I _will_ if you don't answer my questions. Who are you?!"

The girl didn't answer, she just struggled harder.

"WHO! ARE YOU!" he bellowed at her.

Suddenly the girl's eyes turned pure black and she seemed to crackle with electricity. Sparks flew from her very skin, one brighter than the rest making contact with the man's arm. He dropped her reflexively and she immediately took off running.

The scene changed _again_, but this time the memories did not linger. He saw flashes of her, older again (and cleaner), with a small puppy following her about. Then another of her a few years later, at least 13 now, sobbing and holding the same dog, also older. The dog had foam at its mouth and was as still as the grave. With each new memory, he noticed that the places she was were getting increasingly desolate and isolated. Most likely to distance herself from pain and suffering as much as possible. He saw faces, all unfamiliar to him. Some were smiling and some were crying, and others looked scared, as if they were scared of the girl. Memories started to blur together until he wasn't even sure what he was seeing anymore, and all he knew was that he was starting to feel crushed by the amount of sheer emotion.

Then suddenly an image of himself exploded into his vision, and he unexpectedly experienced a burst of excruciating pain. He felt anguish and torturous agony fill him, the emotions that he was sure belonged to the girl. He wondered vaguely how she managed to keep it all inside if _that_ was what she endured when she was around him.

Without warning, he heard a half-roar, half-scream burst forth from his own mouth, and he was released from the forces keeping his hand on her shoulder. He threw himself backwards, breathing heavily. He felt the familiar sensations of losing control start to course through him and he clutched at his head. Turning towards Tony, he saw the man still standing, now with a shocked expression, exactly where he had been and Bruce distantly wondered how long it had actually taken him to see the memories, or if it had happened in the blink of an eye.

As those thoughts were pushed out of his head by the escalating presence of the Other Guy, he let out another yell, although this time it was mostly roar. But then, quite abruptly, it all seemed to stop.

That had never happened before.

Then he noticed that the girl had captured his hand in her own and his rage started to ebb away. He also noticed that blood already seemed to be trickling from her mouth before she even started taking his anger. Perhaps the memories had done that. He didn't dwell on it too much, because now her nose was starting to bleed as well. Red started to flow from her eyes like tears, and they were wheeling blindly, insanely. She looked half-crazed already, but she continued to force the anger out of Bruce as she clutched desperately at his hand. Old scars on her arms started to split and flow red with the violent memories of her past. The very moment the last tendrils of rage faded from his body, the girl was thrown backwards onto the floor. Her body lurched erratically as a spasm ripped through her, but Bruce was too afraid that if he touched her, he would just make it worse. He looked desperately to Tony, who was already calling for Fury, for _anyone_ to come and help over his mini-walkie talkie.

When Bruce looked back at the girl, she was the very definition of still. He couldn't see her chest moving, her hands were no longer tensing spasmodically, and her eyes were wide and staring, unseeing, right through him. Was that really it? Could she really be dead? He grabbed onto her hand tightly, hoping that maybe, just _maybe_, it would wake her up. Or kick-start her heart, if it needed it.

But nothing happened. She just lay as still as ever in a growing pool of blood.


	6. Chapter 6

**A/N I had expected to have this up earlier. My bad. Anyway, enjoy!**

"Adriane!" he yelled, remembering how the woman from the memory had called her that.

The moment the name left his lips, the girl, Adriane, started to softly glow. Fury ran into the room in the next moment and stopped short, taking in the scene in front of him. The glow started to get brighter and brighter until soon the three men were shielding their eyes.

"Is, uh…that supposed to happen?" Tony asked.

"She glowed like that when she was trying to save Agent Coulson, just not as brightly. But I don't know enough about her to tell you what's normal or not," Fury replied, not taking his one good eye off the young girl.

Bruce was still clutching her hand when suddenly he felt her fingers softly tighten, "Hey…hey can you hear me?" he asked loudly.

As the glow started to recede, her fingers tightened on his hand again, and this time they didn't loosen. When she was finally back to her normal, non-glowing state, the three men peered down at her expectantly. Bruce squeezed her fingers again and her eyes fluttered open.

"Hey can you hear me?" he asked again and she hesitantly nodded, "Can you say something?"

She suddenly wrenched her hand out of Bruce's grip and pulled herself into a sitting position, swiping the backs of her hands against her eyes in an attempt to void them of blood. She was pushing herself as far away from Bruce as possible, almost as if she was attempting to fold herself away into the corner of the benches that she was sitting under. Bruce wondered why if she was so desperate to get away she didn't just pop away like she had last time, or at least turn herself intangible and slip away that way. Regardless, Bruce was almost glad that either she couldn't or it just hadn't occurred to her, because he wanted some answers. He was tired of the way that she just waltzed around as she pleased, spying and eavesdropping and sneaking.

"Adriane," he began and suddenly her features turned deadly as she hissed, almost as if she was in pain. He vaguely heard Tony ask how he knew her name, but he ignored him, "What is going on?"

She narrowed her eyes at him angrily, but said nothing.

"_Tell_ _me_!" Bruce yelled at her.

"How did you do that?" she whispered, venom dripping from her voice, her frame shaking with rage.

"Do what?"

"Steal my memories like that. You forced your way in. I felt it," she murmured angrily, her hands scrabbling distractedly at her arms, so that maybe she could get some blood off.

"I have no idea how I did that. I-"

"_Liar_!"

"Bruce, what the hell is going on? What you both talking about? And who the hell is Adriane?" Tony suddenly interjected.

"_She_ is Adriane," the girl flinched and glared at the doctor.

"And what is she saying about memories?" Fury asked.

"'She' is the cat's mother, Fury," Tony murmured under his breath, receiving a glare from the eye-patched man, "What? We finally know her name, why not use it?"

"Will you give me some answers?!" Bruce asked Adriane, his voice still raised, choosing to ignore the bickering behind him.

"I don't _have_ any!" she spat.

"Well fine! Run away again! Just disappear like you always do when you don't want to talk to someone!" Bruce said dismissively and shoved himself to his feet, turning away from her.

"…I can't," she admitted softly. Bruce paused…then turned back to face her. He realised that there was no longer any trace of anger in her face – she just looked confused and hurt.

"What do you mean you can't?" he asked her, his curiosity getting the better of him.

"I…I tried. I can't. And you…you're gone," she murmured, not looking up from the floor.

"I'm gone?" Bruce didn't understand; he was standing right in front of her.

"From my head. Everyone is gone," she whispered.

"Can someone please tell me what the hell is going on?!" Tony pouted, disliking the feeling of being out of the loop.

Bruce's gaze lingered for a moment on Adriane and he noticed that her eyes had turned from a murky grey to a subdued green colour. He then turned around to face Stark and Fury, "When I touched her shoulder before…somehow some of her memories got transmitted straight to me. It was like…watching a movie. And then I got a full blast of…my anger mixed with her anger, and I started to lose control. You were here for the rest," Bruce told them, and then added, "And now apparently she can't feel people's emotions like she normally does. She can't teleport or become intangible either."

"So…why were you a Banner-sized version of the Hulk just now? I've never seen you even speak sternly to someone," Tony said.

"I…" Bruce faltered, because, truth be told, he wasn't even sure why he had gotten so angry.

And as he calmed down, he felt it.

Emotions.

Pressing in on him from all sides. He could _feel_ the anger and confusion and hurt rolling off Adriane in powerful waves, and suddenly his whole body ached. A headache started forming as he tried to stop feeling this way. He could feel the confusion of Fury and Tony. He could feel the throb of a bruise that he _knew_ was coming from Barton. He felt guilt from Agent Romanoff, who was sitting next to Clint, in whatever part of the helicarrier they were in. Frustration of an Agent that had been in charge of watching Loki. The sadness and grief of losing Agent Coulson from everyone, _everywhere_ in the ship.

He could feel it _all_.

"What did you do to me?" he shot at Adriane in a ragged voice.

She peered up at him, "What?"

"You…" he started in an accusing tone, "_You_ put it all in my head. Make it _stop_."

She squinted at him in utter confusion, then her eyes widened a little, "_You_ took it away? It…It's over?"

"'_Over_'?" Bruce repeated, "It's not _over_, it's in my head!"

"I…can't help you," Adriane whispered.

Through the haze of muddled emotions pounding in his head, suddenly everything got a little easier to withstand, and he realised she felt happy. Relieved. Fortunate. This was no longer her cross to bear. Had Bruce not been drowning in terrible emotions, he might have been happy for her too. As it turned out, however, he _was_ drowning in terrible emotions, and so he just got angrier.

"I can't have this in my head!" Bruce yelled.

"And I can?!" Adriane snapped back, narrowing her eyes again, "Why should have to suffer through it-"

"BECAUSE YOU'RE NOT THE FUCKING HULK!" Bruce exploded, referring to himself as 'the Hulk' for the first time in a very long time.

Adriane wiped some more blood from her brow as it threatened to drip into her eye and hissed at Bruce before leaping silently to her feet and storming from the room. Bruce yelled out in frustration and clutched at his head.

"Woah, let's not Hulk out in here, Brucey," Tony said loudly, clapping one hand onto Bruce's shoulder.

With a mammoth effort, Bruce pushed the main bulk of the raw emotion aside and wondered to himself why he _hadn't_ Hulked out yet. He'd certainly gotten angry enough to fuel a loss of control. Were there perhaps other emotions blocking the anger? Maybe sadness didn't work the same way. Did her powers completely block his ability to Hulk out? Could he possibly have become _too_ overloaded with emotions? That last one was unlikely, but he certainly felt that the second option could be feasible – was, in fact, the _most_ feasible.

"I don't think I _can_ Hulk out," Bruce forced out through gritted teeth.

"Well…that's a good thing, isn't it?" Tony shrugged.

"I would rather Hulk than this," Bruce groaned hoarsely as he dropped to his knees and proceeded to curl into the foetal position. He figured that the reason Adriane didn't react to the emotions like this was because she had grown up with it just as it had grown with her, whereas it had been thrust unwillingly upon him in its most potent form.

**A/N Reviews would be lovely :) Either way, thank you for reading!**


	7. Chapter 7

Over the next 24 hours, Bruce was kept sedated to try to keep him from going insane. Adriane had completely disappeared – no one had seen her since she had stormed off one day prior. The helicarrier hadn't landed since then though, so she was somewhere on-board, since there was no way she could have gotten off and survived. Especially now that she had no powers.

An Agent had been tasked with the job of watching the cameras in the hopes that she would pass by one and they would catch her out. They had also run her picture through the database and so if she appeared on-camera, an alert would be sent directly to Fury, but so far she had gone undetected. She even snuck into the kitchen (which was _filled _with cameras) in order to secure some food, but no one had caught her.

It seemed that no one would see her until she wanted to be seen. And _that_ happened in Tony and Bruce's workspace a little over a day after inadvertently giving her powers to Bruce.

Tony was hunched over a microscope, fitting a tiny part into the wrist section of his Iron Man suit when suddenly he heard a small, "Hello Tony Stark," from behind him, which made him jump. As the tiny part rolled away under a bench he placed his hands on either side of the microscope, facing away from Adriane, and bowed his head with a sigh, "I'll have you know that part was worth $2000 alone, and you'll either be replacing or retrieving it."

Turning to face the girl, the first thing he noticed was that the purple rings that usually marred the skin underneath her eyes were missing. The second thing was that her skin seemed less waxy and pallid than he'd ever seen it. The last thing he noticed was that her hands were fidgeting and she seemed to have a nervous twitch in her eye.

"I…I need your h-help," she implored, moving suddenly closer to Tony, "Please!"

"That depends on what you need," Tony remained guarded. Technically this girl had done nothing wrong _intentionally_, but she had still caused Bruce a world of pain that he didn't deserve – Tony couldn't help but feel a little like he owed it to Bruce to make whatever she wanted from him to be even a _little_ more difficult than it had to be.

"I n-need it b-b-back!" Tony couldn't help but notice the stutter that had crept into her voice since he had last heard her speak, "Bruce can't…he won't be able to h-handle the st-stress!"

"I thought you didn't want it," Tony replied.

"I was wr-wrong! I was s-so wrong!" she half-shrieked, "He c-can't…"

"Give him a _little_ credit. I mean the guy _has_ spent a lot of time keeping the Hulk at bay," Tony told her.

"You don't understand! It w-was only supposed to b-be me! It w-was on-o-only ever supposed to be f-for me!" she grabbed Tony's hand and he felt the tremors in hers, "It will kill him!"

"How do you know?" Tony subconsciously leaned away from Adriane.

She dropped his hand, as if just realising that she'd even taken it, and then her large eyes softened, "Have you…have you been to s-see him?"

Tony bristled for a moment before it occurred to him that she didn't sound accusatory – just worried, "No," he admitted.

Without another word, she grabbed his hand and tugged it until he reluctantly started following her. They walked swiftly, but not as silently as she usually did (mostly because of Tony), out the door and took a left, then proceeded down the corridor all the way to the end. They met no one on their short journey, which took them up a floor and through many twists and turns until they finally reached the door that they were looking for. Adriane opened the door and entered the room, not waiting for Tony, who trailed in after her. Bruce was laid out on one of the beds in the room and Tony could instantly see that this was not just a simple medically-induced coma. His face was scrunched up in pain, his skin was waxy and sallow, the purple rings that had once adorned the space underneath Adriane's eyes now sat under Bruce's eyes – he was fairly comparable to how the girl had looked. Except Bruce also had dark, thin lines running just underneath his skin that covered any exposed skin in a network of black veins. Adriane hadn't had those.

"They're physical manifestations of every bad feeling that is being drawn into him. It's poisoning his bloodstream," she seemed a little calmer now that Tony seemed to be taking her seriously.

"Why didn't they tell _me_?" was the next thing to come out of Tony's mouth.

"I don't even think they know what's wrong with him. They knew very little about me and now even less about what's happening. _I_ barely even know what's happening," she admitted.

"But you're sure about this?" Tony asked, seeking confirmation, but dreading the answer.

Adriane hesitated momentarily before saying, "Pretty sure. I mean…this has never happened, but this type of thing never happened to me. I mean I've never gotten the black, veiny…_veins_ before."

"Okay," Tony said slowly, taking in everything he had just learnt, "So we need to get the powers out of him or he'll die. How long do you think we have?"

Adriane opened her mouth to answer the question but was cut off by a yell from the direction of the door, "Hey you can't be in here!"

Turning swiftly to see who had spoken, they saw an Agent, who had started speaking quickly and quietly into his com-device. Within 30 seconds, Director Fury had arrived.

"What are you doing in here Stark?" Fury asked him, sending the agent to guard the door and make sure no one came in.

"I just came to see my friend, that's all," Tony replied as courteously as Tony Stark is capable of being; that is through gritted teeth and narrowed eyes.

"And what is Adriane doing in here? I thought I made it clear to you that any contact with her should be reported to me," Fury continued, ignoring the other man's obvious distaste for the current situation.

"And I thought _I_ made it clear that I wasn't going to follow that order," Tony relaxed a little as his arrogance and sarcasm levels started settling into a steady rise. Fury opened his mouth to reply, but Tony ignored this and continued to talk over the top of whatever it was that the eye-patched man was about to say, "Either way, she's with me. And furthermore, she's _helping_ me," and then Fury saw something that he scarcely ever saw – Tony looked at the taller man and his face morphed into one of complete sincerity, "And I think she might be able to help me to help Bruce," very quickly, he once again assumed an air of nonchalance and arrogance, "So if you don't mind, Patches, we'll be off. Toodle-oo."

As much as Fury hated having his authority undermined, he seemed to understand that they may actually be able to help Dr Banner. His medical team had so far had no luck, but then again they didn't have someone with an intimate knowledge of the powers and what they might be doing to tell them what they knew. He understood that asking Stark to simply advise and assist his medical team would the most fruitless of endeavours – the self-obsessed man had already made that clear – and so he nodded once to let them know that he wasn't going to stop them.

At that, Tony swept out of the room, Adriane slinking after him, somewhat less gracefully than she usually was. Back in the workspace, Tony turned to Adriane and started rapidly firing thoughts and half-formed ideas at her, "So it's poisoning his blood…_what_ is doing the poisoning? It could be the actual powers themselves…maybe they recognise that they're in the wrong body and they're rebelling. Or it could be some sort of…weird immune response… Maybe the Hulk in him is acting in place of his B and T cells and they're waging war within his very body. Or _maybe_ it has to do with his genetic make-up and yours being so wildly different that it's acting like some sort of rejected organ transplant… Though I suppose I could just file that under immune response…"

He continued for about 5 minutes until he seemed to have several main hypotheses formulated and ready to be tested.

"The only problem is…I don't know how much time we have," he finished, and then turned back to Adriane, who had not said a word since he had started his rambling rant, "I've already got Bruce's genetic make-up on-file. Don't look at me like that, he's the Hulk, of course I want to take a sneaky peek. Anyway, we should probably compare yours just to rule out you being some sort of alien or mutant or something."

With all of the state-of-the-art equipment it didn't take long to establish that Adriane's genetic make-up was as a human's should be. Tony immediately moved onto testing her blood for any strange anomalies that might indicate a higher tolerance for the volatile abilities. He reached into his pocket and brought out a vial of blood. Adriane gave him a strange look and he half-shrugged.

"I took it from Bruce before we left," Tony informed her, "But now I need some of yours, so if you don't mind…" he simply grinned as he held up a needle.

"You're enjoying this far too much," Adriane frowned, but rolled up her sleeve anyway and moved closer to Tony. He just laughed as he deftly took the sample and Adriane immediately moved away from him once more.

Half an hour later, Tony established that there was a component of Bruce's blood that was not present in Adriane's. After further testing, it was revealed to be something akin to heavy metal poisoning, albeit on a much larger scale. This extra component did not seem to mix with Bruce's blood, just as oil doesn't mix with water, but when he dropped a part of it into Adriane's blood sample, he found that it readily dispersed and mixed in.

"This is…odd. I can't find any differences in your blood other than the obvious. I can't think of any reason why it agrees with you and not him," he scowled, as though the blood samples were simply doing this to annoy him.

Adriane shrugged, although she knew that he wasn't asking her for an answer.

Tony continued to work on the blood and they slowly and almost simultaneously came to the conclusion that the powers would have to be transferred back into Adriane within the next 12 or so hours or Bruce wouldn't make it through the night.

"Explain to me exactly what happened before this whole switcheroo happened," Tony sighed as he sat down in a chair.

"Well…I don't know exactly…but basically I remember…being upset about…about Phillip…and then Bruce moved towards me and he put his hand on my shoulder. I-I've never experienced anything like it before. It was like every memory I had ever had, even ones that I had repressed and forgotten, were suddenly not mine anymore…or that someone was forcing their way in. I had honestly forgotten my own name and any memories about…my old life. But suddenly they were being laid out for someone else to riffle through. Then I think I remember Bruce beginning to transform into the Other Guy…but things get a little…hazy after that," she finished softly.

"Right well from what I saw, you stopped him Hulking out, but then we all thought you were dead, yada yada yada. Anyway, _then_ you started to glow and Bruce woke you up, and…I dunno, I kind of tuned out, to be honest," Tony shrugged, "So! I think our best bet would be to hook you two up to each other with electrodes and whatnot, give you a bit of a jolt while you're in direct contact with each other, and see if we can recreate the flow of energy or mana or magical bullshit, whatever you want to call it."

Twenty minutes later, Tony had shooed any SHIELD agents or doctors out of the room, and Adriane was lying head-to-head with Bruce. They were connected to each other by several electrodes and Bruce's right hand was clenched in Adriane's left. Tony looked briefly at Adriane, who had her eyes shut at that moment, and noticed that it was the healthiest he'd ever seen her. He knew that if they managed to get the transfer to go through, she would go right back to the sickly, pale girl with the too-big eyes that he was used to. He almost felt a little bad, but if they didn't do this then Banner would surely die. She knew what she was signing up for anyway – he wasn't forcing her to do anything.

"Okay, let's do this," Tony clapped his hands together as he connected both Bruce and Adriane up to a machine that would send an electric current through the both of them in the same way that a circuit would work, "Ready?" he asked and Adriane nodded, "In 3…2…1," The machine let out a soft hum as it started to flow with electricity. The reaction was instantaneous. Bruce and Adriane both immediately went rigid and neither was responsive when Tony said their names. He could see Adriane's eyes flicking around underneath her closed eyelids and wondered if perhaps she was now seeing Bruce's memories, just as Bruce saw hers.

All of a sudden, the machine sending the weak electric current through the two of them sputtered and then without warning, completely exploded. Tony ducked behind another bed that was in the medical bay, and only poked his back up when he was sure that it was over. Stepping out and moving over to the still sparking machine, he waved away some of the smoke with his hand and bent over Bruce.

"Bruce?" No answer, "Hey Brucey?" Still no answer, "Adriane?" But they both remained motionless. Perhaps they still had to do that glowy thing. Tony moved back and looked at the pair, grimacing when nothing happened even after he waited for several minutes. Tony folded his arms out of habit, but unfolded them when he felt something in his jacket pocket pressing into his arm. Reaching in, he fished out the electric prod that he had shocked Bruce with earlier to see if he would Hulk-out. Glancing over at the two and then back at the pen-sized prod, he moved forward again and hesitated only momentarily before pressing it to Bruce's chest and sending a small jolt through his body.

**A/N Big thank you to my new follower LEPrecon :) I hope you're enjoying the story, just as I hope the rest of you are as well! Once again, I would absolutely love a review, even just a short one, but I understand that sometimes it's a hassle so if you don't want to, I get it :)**


	8. Chapter 8

Tony leapt back as Bruce gasped and his eyes shot open, "Bruce!" Tony exclaimed happily.

"Wh-what happened? Why am I… Why do I feel like I got hit by a bus?" Bruce asked groggily.

"How ya feeling Bruce?" Tony smiled.

"…Like I got hit by a bus?" Bruce repeated.

"No I mean…emotion-wise," Tony clarified.

"Oh, I…" Bruce stopped for a moment and closed his eyes. Tony got a bit worried that maybe something was wrong and was about to ask, but then a smile spread across Bruce's face and he said, "It's gone."

Tony smiled triumphantly and a little smugly, "No need to thank me, buddy," despite the fact that Bruce hadn't even done so yet.

"How did you…" Bruce began but trailed off.

"Well I had a bit of help from…oh shit!" Tony quickly moved over to Adriane and used the electric prod on her. But she remained motionless. He tried again, but the result was the same. Bruce struggled to sit up and looked around.

"What did you do to her?" he gasped.

"Hey, she volunteered! Besides, if we left the stuff in you, it would have killed you!" Tony held up his hands in defence, "Beside, she's alive. Just unconscious."

Bruce leaned forwards to touch her cheek, but Tony stopped him quickly, "Woah, woah, woah! We _just_ got the magic crap out of you! Do you have a death-wish!?"

He let his hand fall back to the bed, "You're…you're right," he sighed.

Tony's eyes snapped back to Adriane when he heard her groan softly. He knew immediately that she was back to her original self, because as her eyes struggled open he saw that they were back to their muddy, grey colour. She leaned over the side of the bed and promptly emptied her stomach onto the floor as Tony leapt backwards.

"So…everyone's back to normal?" Tony ventured. Bruce nodded and Adriane scowled at him, "I'll take that as a yes."

Suddenly the intercom burst to life with Fury yelling, "New York is under attack! Repeat, New York is under attack! All personnel report to your assigned stations!"

"Well I guess we're up," Tony grimaced as he ran out of the room to get his suit on, sparing one last glance backwards to look at Adriane and Bruce.

Bruce heard Adriane slide off the bed as she said, "I'm going home. Good luck."

Bruce sighed and rubbed his eyes, moving his glasses out of the way, "Stay safe," he murmured as he turned to Adriane, but she had already disappeared.

He hoped that she had gone somewhere safe, because she deserved a good life, even if he knew that she would never _really_ have one. Staring out of the window for all of two seconds, Bruce pushed himself off the bed, wobbled momentarily, and then hurried out of the room.

* * *

The streets of New York were in utter chaos.

Clint looked down on the city from his perch on the edge of a building. Firing arrows at any aliens that he deemed to be immediate risks, he kept letting his gaze flick back to where he knew Natasha was fighting. A roar to his left made him turn swiftly and he saw that the Hulk was leaping between buildings, crushing any alien in his path. He swivelled his head around in the other direction to see Thor standing atop the Empire State Building, lighting up the aliens that were streaming into their world. He couldn't see Tony anywhere, but occasionally the whine of his repulsors would be close enough for him to hear. Looking back down to the ground as he released another arrow, he saw Cap and Natasha fighting back to back. Natasha had clearly run out of bullets, because she was no longer firing from them and had instead picked up one of the abandoned staffs that a fallen alien soldier would once have been fighting with.

As his eyes picked through the confusion looking for any sign of Loki, Tony flew past at top speed and Clint flicked on his comm device, "Stark, you have about twenty bogies right on your tail."

He heard the other end click to life and Tony replied drily, "Yes, I'd noticed. Got any ideas?"

Clint considered this momentarily, his brain working at three times normal capacity – he had always performed well under pressure – then replied, "Well, they can't bank worth a damn. Find a tight corner."

Not waiting for Tony to reply, he loosed another arrow, which found its home directly between the eyes of an alien that was headed his way. He heard something heavy drop onto the roof behind him and swiftly rolled out of the way. Bringing the bow in his hands up and around into the side of the thing's head, he leapt to his feet and stabbed the alien through the chest with the sharpened end of his weapon. He took several steps to the side, his feet crossing over in a sort of grapevine manoeuvre, as another alien landed and he reached back for another arrow. At such close range, the arrow travelled right through the alien's head and out the other side. Breathing heavily and looking at the bodies scattered around him, he quickly established that none were left alive and quickly set about gathering used arrows.

Once he had gathered as many as he could, he resumed his position as scout and far-off slayer of aliens. As his eyes drifted across the fight, looking for things that people should be attending to, something caught his eye. A girl was standing in the building across from the one that he was in. The window was smashed, so she was exposed to the fight, but she didn't look like the scared people that had popped up in some other windows that were attempting to see what was happening. She had her arms raised and the air around her seemed a little shimmery. Clint suddenly realised that she was that girl who had read his mind. He recognised the lank, black hair, the thin frame, and the gaunt look in her face. Loosing another arrow on a deadly path towards an alien, he looked at her again and wondered what she was doing. As he looked, he noticed that any aliens that were zooming between the two buildings seemed to be inexplicably losing control of their crafts. She didn't look like she was in need of help, so Clint turned away and started firing arrows at more aliens. He spared a glance back at the window, but the girl was gone. Hoping she was okay, but knowing that even if she wasn't, there was nothing he could do, he turned away once more.

* * *

Tony shot a repulsor beam at an alien that had been tailing him, and rocketed off towards the cluster of Chitauri that were surrounding Cap and Natasha. Blasting three of their heads clean off, Tony barrelled into several more, allowing Steve to regain the upper hand while Natasha grabbed another alien staff and disposed of at least six more. Once Tony was satisfied that they could handle in on their own, he zoomed off in search of Loki. He found him quite quickly on the balcony of Stark Tower in the middle of a heated battle with Thor. Deciding it was best to only interfere if Thor looked like he needed it, he instead set his sights on the portal. Careening down the main road, he heard his comm device crackle in his ear.

"Stark, you have about twenty bogies on your tail," he heard Barton's voice.

Whipping his head around, he saw that he was indeed being followed by a big posse of alien scum. Not wanting to appear as if he hadn't known, he replied casually, "Yes, I'd noticed. Got any ideas?"

There was a momentary pause, and then Clint said, "Well, they can't bank worth a damn. Find a tight corner."

Tony nodded to himself and sped into a street on his right. Weaving between cars, wanting to stay as low as possible, he heard at least two explosions, signifying their inability to think on their feet. Tony suddenly banked right, then left, then straight for a building before sharply flying up. Peering down, he saw that not a single craft remained and smirked to himself. Idiots.

Suddenly he felt himself get thrown backwards. Slamming into several cars, he quickly leapt back to his feet, firing repulsor beams all the while. An alien jumped onto his back and forced him to the ground before receiving a well-aimed zap to the head. His suit had taken a fair amount of damage over the last half hour, but Tony didn't let it worry him; this suit wasn't even close to breaking point.

"Sir, suit is at 20% charge," JARVIS' disembodied voice came floating into Tony's ears.

Tony was about to reply, but was interrupted by Nick Fury, "You guys have a nuke headed right for Manhattan. ETA is 2 minutes."

He heard Steve start to say something, but tuned it out as he focused back on the aliens. Converting as much energy as he could to the thrusters, he jetted up and away from the things that appeared to be playing stacks-on with him as the stackee.

Interrupting Steve, Tony simply said, "I'm on it."

Allowing the thrusters to burn at full capacity, he felt himself flying faster than he ever thought he could; pushing himself to the very limits so that he might save as many people as possible. As he met the nuke, he found that he barely had to think before flying right alongside it, and then manoeuvring himself so that he was pressed against the underbelly of the nuke. Wrapping his arms back and around it, he pressed it harder into him so that there was no chance of it getting away from him.

"I can close the portal!" came Natasha's voice, suddenly blaring in his ears.

"No!" Tony yelled back, "Not yet."

"What do you mean 'not yet'?!" Steve interjected.

"I'm carrying a fucking _nuke_. I don't know about you, but I don't know where _else_ to put it," Tony snapped back.

And suddenly he realised what this would mean. His suit had about 4% power left, since so much of it had been used in the thrusters. He would not have enough power to get back through the portal. What was more, this suit was not as advanced as the one he usually wore. In order to make it able to pack itself into a smaller storage pod, he had sacrificed some advancements that would really help him now.

Pulling himself into an upward spiral, Tony looked down and time seemed to stop. Though he knew he must have glanced down for only a second, he saw everything spread out before him in agonising detail. Natasha was poised to shut off the portal, Selvig standing beside her. Clint was battling more aliens than he could handle, and without any arrows. Cap was practically overrun with dozens of aliens coming at him in waves. Thor was still using his lightning to slaughter aliens in droves, but for each one he killed, two more would take their place. They were steadily advancing towards him. The Hulk was the only one who didn't seem to have lost any steam, but even he was becoming a little overwhelmed by the sheer number of enemies.

JARVIS scattered his thoughts as he said, "Sir, would you like to place a call to Miss Potts?"

Tony was about to say that they needed the power, but decided that it hardly mattered anyway, "May as well."

Tony heard the ringing in his ear, and it echoed horribly, reminding him that this would be the last time he would ever talk to Pepper. His girlfriend. The woman he loved. Each ring was mocking him, she wasn't picking up and the more time it took, the less likely it was that she would pick up at all. The portal raced closer and closer and before he knew it, he was in deep space. There was a slight delay, but soon his suit realised that it was in a place that it was not built to go. He felt bits of the suit start to shut down. The weapons first – he had no power being supplied to there anyway, it was all going to the thrusters and the phone call – then the call failed, oxygen supply ceased next, and finally the thrusters began to stutter. He was still being propelled towards the mothership and he held onto the nuke desperately just in case it veered off course. The thrusters and the display in front of him failed at the same time and he heard the soft whir of the suit shutting down completely. Sure now that the nuke would not miss, he released his grip. He was still close enough to the portal that gravity had an effect on him and so now that he no longer had anything to facilitate forward momentum, he felt himself beginning to fall back towards it. He got a fleeting glimpse of the ship imploding on itself as his thoughts became sluggish from lack of oxygen. He wondered why it didn't explode gloriously, but then remembered that he was a deep space. The last thought he had before he blacked out was of the diamond ring sitting in a safe back in his tower and Pepper's face.

**A/N There will be one more chapter after this. Also I know the action scenes kind of suck; I'm not great at writing those, so I hope they are acceptable :)**

**Also thank you to Margaret, who reviewed the seventh chapter :)**


	9. Chapter 9

Clint stared up at the sky. The enemies had fallen and the fight was over, but his gut was still roiling with uncertainty and even fear. Tony had done what no one thought he would and sacrificed himself for the good of Manhattan and the rest of the human race. Natasha was poised to shut the portal, but refused to do so until she could see Tony again. Her comm device had obviously been damaged, because she seemed unable to turn it off, so Clint and the rest of the team heard Selvig's next words.

"You have to close it!"

"I can't leave Tony!" was Natasha's immediate reply.

"The portal is destabilising! The Tesseract will explode and take half the world with it if you don't close it off! I want to wait for Tony just as much as you do, but we just can't!"

Clint imagined that Natasha was scrunching her face up in disgust at what she was about to do – it was a common look of hers – and then he watched as the portal began to shrink in size until it disappeared completely with a soft pop. But not before something fell through it. Tony.

Clint felt his whole body relax a little as he watched the billionaire tumble through the air, most likely aiming to right himself any moment. But instead he continued to fall.

"He's not slowing down!" Clint heard Cap say, and he glanced over at the super soldier.

As Tony continued to fall, Cap tensed as if he was about to run and try to catch the man, but before he could move an inch, a roar sounded and suddenly a big, green blur was hurtling towards the tumbling Stark. Grabbing onto a building to slow his descent, the Hulk landed quite unceremoniously on the ground, Tony clutched tightly in his arms. Clint and Cap ran over as Hulk deposited the limp man on the ground. Thor landed roughly beside them and stared around them before his eyes came to rest on Tony. He strode over when none of them moved and gripped the Iron Man mask before ripping it off and tossing it aside. Cap and Clint moved closer as they inspected the man's face. It was relaxed and the arc reactor was not glowing as it usually did. Cap was about to step forward and check his pulse, but without warning, the Hulk roared directly at Tony.

The men standing around all leapt back – well Thor really only took a half-step – just as Tony's eyes shot open and the arc reactor flickered back to life. He gasped several times and then struggled to lift his head to look around himself before saying breathily, "What happened?! What did…oh god. Oh my god. What the fuck? Just…what happened?"

There was only a momentary pause before Cap said, "We won."

Tony's head fell back to rest where the Iron Man helmet held it slightly above the level of the ground, "Awesome. That's just…that's awesome. So now we can call it a day, right? I'm so ready for a shower."

"We have to deal with Loki first," said Bruce, who had just reappeared after the Hulk had shrunk. He held the tatters of his pants to keep as much modesty as possible and looked wobbly on his feet.

Tony sighed exaggeratedly, "Can't we just…clap him in irons, or something?"

The others chuckled a little before Cap went to help Tony up. On the way back to Stark Tower, Tony started loudly planning the parade that he believed was going to be thrown in his honour. Gold leaf confetti, a medal from the President, and an adult-sized jumping castle all featured in his plans. When they arrived at the tower where Bruce assured them Loki would still be after he had pancaked him into the floor and Thor confirmed that he had still been there when he had flown down to see Tony after he'd fallen back through the portal. He probably could have left the tower before they got there, but he no longer had his staff, he had no army, and he didn't have enough strength to use too much magic. Thor also thought that perhaps with the staff no longer in his possession, Loki could see a little more clearly. The blue of his eyes had unnerved them while they were fighting, because he had grown up seeing a subtle green colour. Thor was sure that the Tesseract and the staff had had some sort of control over Loki, because the new eye-colour was exactly the same blue as that of the Tesseract itself.

Once they arrived on the right floor, they found Loki sitting cross-legged on the floor, staring out the window. Natasha was perched on the countertop of the bar, watching him warily. Loki didn't even turn around as he said, "And so the Avengers reign triumphant." There was some bitterness in his voice, but he sounded more resigned and weary than furious, as half of them expected him to be.

Thor offered his hand to Loki, but when the raven-haired demigod didn't take it, he grasped his upper arm and pulled him to his feet. Once upright, Loki stood proudly, exuding a false air of confidence. He sneered around at the team, but cooperated, albeit reluctantly. At that moment, a helicopter could be heard making its way towards the tower and Nick Fury jumped down onto the balcony when it became visible through the window. He walked inside holding a box and place it on the floor. Opening it, he took out a pair of heavy-duty handcuffs, which he promptly locked around Loki's wrists. He then pulled out another contraption that the majority of the people in the room didn't recognise. Fury slipped it over Loki's head and fastened it around his mouth – it was a gag.

Utterly humiliated, Loki was led out of the room by two SHIELD agents that had leapt down from the chopper, and Fury.

"So…now what?" Bruce asked.

"I have something I need to do," Tony announced. He swiftly snatched up his mobile, which had survived the destruction wrought to his tower and dialled a familiar number.

Before anyone was able to pick up, the door opened once more and there stood Pepper, her ringing phone in her hand. Tony hung up as he dropped the phone back to the counter, stared for a moment, and then loudly said, "Marry me. Pepper Potts, I want you to be my wife. Please marry me."

Pepper's hands leapt to her mouth but then she said, "Is this only because you nearly died? Because if it is, I want to wait until this isn't some adrenaline fuelled proposal."

"Just because it's adrenaline fuelled, doesn't mean I don't mean it. I've been thinking about this for months. I'll prove it," Tony smirked as he walked over to his bar and slid back a panel to reveal a safe. Punching in the code, he opened it and brought out a small, velvet box. He walked over to Pepper and opened it up. The ring inside was exactly Pepper's style; though Tony could have afforded the biggest rock on the planet, he had selected an elegant ring with a brilliant diamond perched on the band.

"Yes," she whispered, and Tony took the ring, threw the box away and slipped it on.

The Avengers, who were all smiling widely (even Natasha, because – despite popular belief – she _does_ have a heart), burst into applause.

"Let's just keep this quiet for now," Pepper told Tony, who pouted, but then she continued, "Tony, the city was just invaded. Lots of people died. This is…it's a time of tragedy."

Tony grimaced, wondering if perhaps he should have waited, but agreed anyway.

"We have some cleaning up to do," Cap piped up in the silence, "And people that still need help."

The team nodded and turned to go back outside. Once Bruce had changed, he followed the team outside and they started to spread out. Cap went to help carry injured people out of buildings, Thor helped to lift rubble that had trapped some civilians, Clint and Natasha assisted and treated people with injuries since they were trained in first aid, and Tony, who had also changed into a different suit, started using the in-built laser to cut away debris that was surrounding some buildings, thereby preventing the people inside from getting out and getting medical attention. Bruce looked around and decided to use his medical expertise to help those in need. He started to walk towards where Natasha and Clint had set up a triage, with the help of SHIELD's medical team.

For hours they treated anyone that came before them, treating the worse injuries first. Once they had been treated by the triage squad, they were ferried to a shopping centre several blocks down where SHIELD had set up a sort of temporary hospital. In several huge warehouses that were not currently housing anything, cots had been placed, and people were being taken there if their places of residence had been destroyed or were too close to ground-zero. A huge perimeter was set up that was not allowing any unauthorised people from entering and several missing persons registers were set up around this perimeter. When names were taken for anyone being treated, they would be sent to these registers so that people might be able to find their missing family members.

Eventually the flow of injured people slowed and Bruce figured he would go and help with body recovery. SHIELD had at least a hundred agents working in the triage area after all, and had spared only a few dozen for this gruesome detail. He walked down the street until he reached the point that the recovery agents had gotten up to. The first person he pulled out of the wreckage was a young brunette woman who had had her skull caved in. The second was the upper half of a man; Bruce didn't find his legs until Thor came past and helped to move some rubble. Bruce knew that when working with the dead, he should have some of protection on, but since he had had his gamma accident, he had never once been sick; he didn't even think he _could_ get sick anymore. The first child he found made him stop for a moment as a few tears leaked down his face. He was just a little boy, surely no older than 5. His blonde hair was matted to his skull with thick, red blood. His head lolled at an unnatural angle, and Bruce tried to cradle him as much as he could so that his neck would not look so broken. He placed him in one of the rows of bodies. It all felt too impersonal to Bruce, but there was nothing else to be done.

When Bruce shifted part of a fallen billboard out of the way, his heart clenched and his stomach dropped. There in front of him lay the pale, still body of Adriane. Bruce moved towards her, his mouth going dry and his breathing becoming ragged as if he'd just run a marathon. There was a hole in her chest, directly where her heart should have been. The edges of it were burnt-looking, as if she'd been stabbed by a white-hot sword. Her death was no accident; this was the work of Loki. Her eyes were closed and she looked peaceful in death, as though she had welcomed it. Bruce wondered if perhaps she did. Maybe she saw it as an end to her constant suffering. He had thought that she had gone somewhere far away, somewhere safe. She knew that this war was going to be fought and she could have gone to any part of the world she wanted. It was for this reason that Bruce decided that she had _wanted_ to be there, she had wanted to help.

Bruce gingerly reached down to touch her cheek, but stopped short, too afraid to actually make contact. Taking a deep breath, he closed his eyes briefly and then gently brushed his fingers against her bruised skin. He let out the breath he had been holding when he realised that nothing was going to happen. She was cold. So cold. _Too _cold. Unable to look away from her, or indeed even to blink, he wondered how long she had been dead. Was it right at the start of the fight? Or maybe closer to the end? It was obviously sometime before he had flattened Loki. He sat down heavily beside her and cautiously pulled her into his arms with great care.

"Adriane," he whispered, his eyes growing warm with unshed tears. Looking back at the spot where she had lain, he could see the dark red evidence of her death seeping into the concrete sidewalk. He stared for a moment before looking back to her and half growling. He felt a surge of anger, but roughly shoved back at it. He would not lose control; not in front of her, dead though she may have been. This wasn't supposed to happen to her. She was supposed to go away; far, _far_ away. She had already lived a life of pain and loss just as Bruce had…the difference was that she was still just a kid.

Bruce didn't hear Tony walk up behind him, only noticing when the man clapped a hand on his shoulder. Bruce looked up at him to see him looking sadly down at Adriane. For once, he remained tight-lipped and silent, a grimace contorting his features.

"She was fighting from up there," Tony eventually said, pointing up at the building that they were in front of, "I flew by a few times. I didn't realise…"

Bruce imagined that Tony was trying to say that it didn't occur to him that she had been killed. Perhaps when he flew past and she wasn't there, he just figured that she had gone elsewhere, or had just no longer had the strength to fight. It was a hectic time and Bruce didn't blame Tony for not realising – there would have been no way for him to save her anyway.

"Maybe it's better this way," Bruce murmured roughly, "How she was living…that's no existence. I'm surprised she hadn't gone insane."

Taking a deep breath, Bruce stood and carried her over to the rows of bodies and laid her gently next to a teenage boy that an agent had just placed there. Bruce looked back only once as they went to resume their work as he thought to himself bitterly, 'I wish things had turned out differently.'

**A/N And that's all folks. Reviews are incredibly appreciated :)**


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